NASA’s InSight Lander Says Goodbye With Heartbreaking, Final Upload From Mars

The time has come to say goodbye to NASA’s Mars InSight lander, as the robot has sent out what could quite possibly be its final picture from the Red Planet. 

According to Engadget, the lander has been hard at work gathering data about the Martian environment since it landed back in November 2018. Till now, it’s been helping researchers compile a better picture of the planet’s interior structure by monitoring the surface’s marsquakes.

Throughout the last four years, InSight has provided information on over 500 such quakes, and at least one meteoroid impact on Mars. Although, over time, due to the planet’s dusty conditions, layers of particles have slowly been building up on its solar panels. 

Heartbreakingly, it appears the layer of dust has now become too thick for InSight’s solar panels to operate, leaving the robot to issue a goodbye via its Twitter page, writing: “My power’s really low, so this may be the last image I can send.” 

“Don’t worry about me though: my time here has been both productive and serene. If I can keep talking to my mission team, I will—but I’ll be signing off here soon. Thanks for staying with me,” it said. 

The robot hasn’t been responding to communications from Earth since earlier in the week, and with its power having declined over the past few months, it could very well signal the end of the machine’s operations. 

NASA had predicted the robot’s demise earlier this year, when it announced in May that it expected InSight to stop working by the end of the summer. It seems the hardworking machine surpassed expectations, making it all the way to winter. 

My power’s really low, so this may be the last image I can send. Don’t worry about me though: my time here has been both productive and serene. If I can keep talking to my mission team, I will – but I’ll be signing off here soon. Thanks for staying with me. pic.twitter.com/wkYKww15kQ

— NASA InSight (@NASAInSight) December 19, 2022

[via Engadget and NASA InSight, cover image via NASA InSight]